Maidens of Destiny

Paper Summary:

This paper explores the similarities and differences of Thomas Hardy's "Tess of D'Urbervilles" and Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter" in the areas of purpose, audience, symbolism, and author background. It delves into the development of each heroine as a product of her society.

From the Paper:

"Love, sin, and innocence have existed as long as humanity, and so, they have been violated for just as long. The complicated themes evoked by the intermixing of these concepts with the laws of Nature, God, and man have long been explored in literature. Nathaniel Hawthorne and Thomas Hardy are two authors who have sought to portray these themes in two vastly different settings. Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter demonstrates the Calvinistic values that characterized Puritan social and cultural life, while Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles demonstrates the Evangelical values dominant during the Victorian period. The tone of the two books differs significantly, most notably in the sense that Hawthorne uses the theme of isolation and a greater Natural law to question both the effect and relevance of Puritan values on daily human life and Hardy uses Tess's life to question Evangelical religious tenets; however, the novels also demonstrate the similarity between the two philosophies. The positions of the main characters at the end provide an exposition of each author's means of achieving his purpose, as do the journeys of each heroine. The influence of society and the nature of his audience as perceived by each author leads both to implement plot, symbolism, description, and allusion in intensely divergent ways to impart a remarkably similar theme of societal hypocrisy and morality in contrast with that of Nature."

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